The 411 On Why Being Vegan Is As Easy As Pie

Near and dear to my heart… cauliflower wings!

We’re making cauliflower wings!!!

I LOVE cauliflower wings. SO much. I could make them for dinner every night if cauliflower wasn’t so damn expensive when it’s not in season!

My boyfriend Jon and I decided to try out the whole cauliflower wings “trend” last September. We found a couple recipes that we liked, merged them to make our own, then got cooking. We were both BLOWN AWAY with how delicious and amazing and life-changing these cauliflower wings were that they have been a fun dinner staple ever since.

I’ve had cauliflower wings before that are pretty much just steamed cauliflower with hot sauce. Steamed veggies? Boring. I am nooottttttttt down with that.

The reason why I like the way that I make my cauliflower wings so much is that they’re breaded but they’re not fried, so you get that good crispy breading without all that oil. Plus, there’s something healthy feeling about them. I don’t know how to describe it, but they’re one of the few meals that makes me feel like I’m both indulging and eating clean at the same time.

I also almost always feel like what I’m eating (if it’s breaded) would be better fried. This is one of the few times that I feel like only the oven will do this meal justice. Plus, it’s the healthier option!

So the recipe that I’m posting below is a chipotle-seasoned cauliflower wing one. You can use whatever hot sauce flavor that you’d like though! Jon and I like doing a mix of both chipotle and regular hot sauce because it adds a delicious smoky flavor, and also isn’t as spicy if you used just straight up reg hot sauce.

Mix the flour, garlic powder, and soy milk until smooth. This will make a thick batter, you want it to be thick enough that it’ll create a good breading on your cauli-wings, but not tooooo thick that you can’t move a fork through it without exerting effort. (Weird thing to write in a set of recipe instructions!)

Break your cauliflower into wing-sized pieces. I personally love big pieces of cauliflower (which are pictured in my photos) where as Jon likes smaller ones. Whatever you can see yourself liking more, do that! One lil tip tho, I like to go with the cauliflower’s natural shape. A head of cauliflower naturally has little sections that if you break off, are super round and not all flat on one side cause you chopped it in half with a knife. I like to keep mine round and natural feeling!

Toss your cauliflower in the batter, and place on a baking sheet/pan covered in parchment paper. (You neeeeed to use parchment paper, or else the cauliflower will stick and the breading will come off when you try to scrape it up! True, sad story…) Make sure that the pieces are not touching, cause if they are they will bake together and become a uni-cauliflower!

Bake for 25 minutes, or until the breading is starting to turn golden-brown. I like to let mine get crispy, so sometimes I even leave them in for a half hour.

While the cauliflower bakes, mix the melted butter and the hot sauces in a large mixing bowl until combined.

When the cauliflower looks crispy enough, take them out of the oven and put them in the large bowl with the hot sauce mixture. You want to evenly coat them with the hot sauce, and I have a technique that I prefer to use! I used to just use a spatula to mix it all around, but it was super clumsy and didn’t work too well. My new technique is to place a bowl of equal size upside down over the bowl filled with cauliflower, and shake, kinda like you would with a salad to get it evenly dressed!

Place the hot-sauced cauliflower pieces back on the pan with the parchment. If there’s any leftover hot sauce, I like to spatula it back onto the cauliflower wings before I put them back in the oven, to keep them nice and juicy! Bake for 5 more minutes, or until the hot sauce starts to make a delish sizzle noise. Take them out of the oven, toss again if there’s still any sauce in the pan, and you’re good to go!